You started a sub discussion regarding what any "war" on anything a government has won. You were then offered many examples but couldn't understand how a subject can also be an object.

I didn't start the sub discussion. I simply responded to it.

I was offered many irrelevant examples.

I pointed out their irrelevancy.

Any Garyesque "war on" guns to "stop their manufacture" will have the exact same results as every other "war on" a "vice" market has had. Attack the demand side, and you accomplish exactly nothing. Attack the supply side, and for every supplier you take down, ten more will spring up in place.

If there's ANYTHING relevant about the disease examples, it is that FIRST the government has to engage in a sweeping education campaign.

Unlike with diseases, you will not succeed in an education campaign to convince a majority of the population that guns are a "disease" that should be eradicated. Furthermore, your right to polio is NOT an inalienable right. LOL

They have ZERO to do with the "gun problem," and how they were regulated is irrelevant to the "gun problem" in all respects.

Nobody is debating that the government can make laws.

Nobody is debating that the government can successfully regulate.

Nobody is debating that the government can encourage new products to spring up.

And none of your examples represent inalienable rights!

None of your examples is mentioned in the constitution, with reference to a pre-existing right that "shall not be INFRINGED."

The DAY the government can encourage some new self-defense product that has all of the advantages of guns and without the "negative side-effects," that is the day your DDT example might have some relevancy.

Meanwhile, the market WILL have guns, and NO amount of legislation will keep guns out of the hands of criminals.

I'll quote from that last one, which quotes from a University of Melbourne study in 2008, plenty of years after the 1996 package of sweeping gun control like will almost certainly never happen in this country:

"[a]lthough gun buybacks appear to be a logical and sensible policy that helps to placate the publicís fears, the evidence so far suggests that in the Australian context, the high expenditure incurred to fund the 1996 gun buyback has not translated into any tangible reductions in terms of firearm deaths."

Also from that same article:

A 2006 study published in the British Journal of Criminology that studied Australia similarly noted, "There is insufficient evidence to support the simple premise that reducing the stockpile of licitly held civilian firearms will result in a reduction in either firearm or overall sudden death rates."

After the Australian government "bought back" over 640,000 personal, previously legally-owned firearms, in the following seven years it watched as the average annual firearm-caused homicides dropped by a paltry 3.2% (2003 study by the left-leaning Brookings Institute, which also noted that homicide by firearms had been in slow but steady decline for two decades before the 1996 passage of sweeping gun control). So, there was no significant effect of Australian's gun control in terms of firearm-caused homicide.

When that law passed in 1996, the Australian government spent $500 million dollars "buying back" (how can it be "buying back" if they never owned them in the first place) over 640,000 guns which they then destroyed. Subsequent to that, there has been no significant decline in felonious gun usage, and this is documented by many sources, not the least of which is the Australian government's own New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research which in 2005 published a report documenting no significant reduction. When criticized by gun control proponents for releasing their results, the head of that bureau, Don Weatherburn, responding saying:

"The fact is that the introduction of those laws did not result in any acceleration of the downward trend in gun homicide. They may have reduced the risk of mass shootings but we cannot be sure because no one has done the rigorous statistical work required to verify this possibility. It is always unpleasant to acknowledge facts that are inconsistent with your own point of view. But I thought that was what distinguished science from popular prejudice."

Now there's a CRITICAL part of that quote from Australia's OWN department that would know the FACTS better than anybody. And it's particularly prescient when considered in the context of this very thread. We'll see how many "get it."

It is always unpleasant to acknowledge facts that are inconsistent with your own point of view. But I thought that was what distinguished science from popular prejudice.

There's this pesky thing about Australia's "success." As the New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research itself admits, there has been NO demonstrable "success" from the effort. And we're far enough into the experiment now to be able to tell something.

Credit: madbolter1

The number of gun-caused homicides in Australia in 1996 was 354. Three years later, that number peaked at 385. It declined slightly through 2002, where it then peaked again at over 360. And from 2003 to 2007 (the last data that FactCheck had) there was a decline to 282 in 2007. And these facts are skewed by two significant realities:

1) 1996 was an elevated year, as that was the year in which the Port Arthur massacre claimed 35 lives.

2) Pick a time-slice in the graph, and you can show a "trend" any direction you please. There's nothing special about 2003-2007. Instead, look at 2004-2006, which shows an increasing trend instead of decreasing.

Again, the best summary comes from their own crime statistic department, which, in the interests of scientific accuracy rather than bias, concluded: "The fact is that the introduction of those laws did not result in any acceleration of the downward trend in gun homicide." That's because there was already a long-term downward trend, and radical gun control did nothing measurable to affect that trend.

And Wikipedia actually has a well-researched and cited article on the subject that draws the same overall conclusions. It's a much better summary of credible sources than I would be able to compile in an evening's work!

And, as just an example of how "time-slicing" can get you whatever "trends" you care to shake a stick at, in 2000, four years after the gun-control legislation, "success" could be cast this way:

* homicides up 3.2 percent

* assaults up 8.6 percent

* armed robberies up over 44 percent

* In Victoria, gun homicides up 300 percent

Instead of "success," Australia has experienced its overall violent crime rate (not including homicide) significantly increase. There are many studies that support this claim, but I'll cite just one article that is a jumping-off point for others.

So, in the end, what do we know? A knee-jerk reaction to the Port Arthur mass-shooting has not increased an overall declining homicide rate that was trending for decades prior to the 1996 law and that in particular time-slices can be shown to actually increase gun-caused homicides; and that has led to a significant increase in assault, home invasions, and other violent crime.

Of course, Australian statistics are a classic example of "lies, damned lies, and statistics," as any statistical discussion can "make" either the gun-control OR anti-gun-control case! My points here are (obviously) designed to "make" the anti-gun-control case. I readily admit that a gun-control case can be made from the same data! And that's the beauty and fun of statistical interpretation (the "damned lies").

For my own part, I'll accept what the widely-cited and extremely credible Australian statistician, Don Weatherburn, stated: "The fact is that the introduction of those laws did not result in any acceleration of the downward trend in gun homicide."

Oh, and Australia COULD legally do this to its citizens, because THEIR founders didn't have to foresight to mention the pre-existing right of self-defense and defense against tyranny, and explicitly place that right and the resulting governmental hands-off policy in our founding documents. Ours did have the foresight. And, because our founders knew that even the causal evidence wouldn't be enough to convince unreasonable minds, they appealed to a priori principles instead.

It is patently obvious that the poster child for the anti-gun crowd is
undoubtedly the good Don Quixote. Although he was a man on a noble quest
I fear he would be bemused by the hand-wringers who would rather tilt at
similar phantasms than concern themselves with addressing the reasons why
people want to kill each other. To wit, how about passing some meaningful
laws like:

If Thou Dost Not Graduate From High School With a C Average Thou
Shalt Have Thine Tubes Tied In Perpetuity.

My 'data' shows this would reduce homicides by 39% as well as take many
beaters off the streets. Well, wife-beaters anyway.

My CZ 75T is a superb race gun right out of the box. Although it doesn't beat my Les Baers, it has 2.5 times the mag capacity.

I like the french set triggers on my CZ rifles too.

But my original CZ 75 just hit the sideline with a failed return spring on the trigger. Just goes to show how easily a fine firearm (Jeff Cooper's choice as best sidearm no less) can be reduced to a club or rock.